PLAYERS Championship Odds and Betting Preview March 10-13

PLAYERS Championship Betting Preview

WagerTalk golf handicappers Nick Borrman and Andy Lang offer their thoughts on this week’s PLAYERS Championship from the TPC Sawgrass Stadium Course in Palm Valley, Florida. Nick and Andy discuss the guys at the top of the odds board, some potential longshots that could crack the PLAYERS Championship leaderboard and some intriguing head-to-head matchups.

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PLAYERS Championship	PGA Tour Betting Notes
When:	March 10-13, 2022
Where:	TPC Sawgrass Stadium Course in Palm Valley, Florida
Defending Champ:	Justin Thomas
Current Favorite:	Jon Rahm and Justin Thomas (+1000 at DraftKings)
TV:	Golf Channel on Thursday and Friday; NBC on Saturday and Sunday

PLAYERS Championship Odds Board

Top-10 Strokes Gained Tee-to-Green over the last six months (betting odds via DraftKings):
Justin Thomas +2.13 (+1000)
Daniel Berger +1.88 (+3000)
Luke List +1.87 (+18000)
Jon Rahm +1.73 (+1000)
Will Zalatoris +1.72 (+4000)
Xander Schauffele +1.63 (+2500)
Rory McIlroy +1.62 (+1600)
Russell Henley +1.57 (+5500)
Collin Morikawa +1.53 (+1400)
Joaquin Niemann +1.51 (+5000)

Top-10 Total Strokes Gained over the last six months (betting odds via DraftKings):
Patrick Cantlay +2.46 (+2000)
Justin Thomas +2.36 (+1000)
Cameron Smith +2.08 (+3000)
Collin Morikawa +2.04 (+1400)
Scottie Scheffler +1.98 (+2000)
Daniel Berger +1.96 (+3000)
Rory McIlroy +1.96 (+1600)
Viktor Hovland +1.88 (+2200)
Sungjae Im +1.73 (+5000)
Jon Rahm +1.68 (+1000)

From Nick Borrman: At TPC Sawgrass, I will tell you with all the confidence in the world, the winner is likely to come from one of these top-10 lists. Sawgrass always demands precision ball striking, but with the weather forecast as it is now, any errant shots will be in for a world of trouble.

TPC Sawgrass

Sawgrass is one of the meccas in the golf world. A course every non-touring professional wants to play and will tell you the story of what they did on No. 17. It is considered Pete Dye’s masterpiece and challenges even the best in the world. Because of how difficult it can play, any slight miscues are often exacerbated and if your game isn’t rock-solid, you can expect to be going home after Friday.

Because of that, there are no ‘horse for the course’ plays here. Past winners have also had terrible showings. Rory sandwiched his win in 2019 with a MC before and after. Tiger, although he has two wins here, has struggled more at this course than almost any other.

The PLAYERS Championship Field

The field is the best of the year with 47 of the top-50 players in the world competing for a ridiculous $3.6M winners prize! Only Phil Mickelson, Bryson DeChambeau and Harris English are not teeing it up this week.

The story of the week is once again going to be the weather. Last week, especially on the weekend, Bay Hill played very tough for the guys and this week looks like it could be even worse with high winds forecasted all four days along with high probabilities of rain.

If they are actually able to finish on Sunday, temperatures are going to drop to a high only in the mid-50s. It’s March in Florida and this is what you get! Like last week, pars will win this event and the guys that can avoid the big numbers will be the only ones standing come Sunday.

Nick’s Picks

While there have been some longshots that have won here in the past, this week, because of the weather, seems very unlikely we see anybody other than the top-20 or so in the world prevail. I’ll be playing my longshots as top-20 or matchups bets this week and sticking to the favorites for outright plays.

Collin Morikawa +1600 (DraftKings) | Top-10 +180 (DraftKings)
Morikawa has just one start at Sawgrass to his name, finishing T41 here last year, but as I mentioned before, I don’t think course history matters too much here. What I do like about him is how well he has been playing coming in.

Since the Tour Championship, Morikawa has played in eight events with six Top-10s including a win at the DP World Tour Championship. He roared up the leaderboard on the weekend in his last start finishing T2 at the Genesis.

His ball-striking is as good as it gets on Tour, ranking #8 SG Off the Tee and #4 SG Approach plus he ranks #4 SG Putting which puts him as the #1 player on Tour in Total SG this season. He ranks 1st in Scoring Average, 2nd in Greens in Regulation and #12 in Driving Accuracy.

Patrick Cantlay +2400 (FanDuel) | Top-20 +250 (FanDuel)
I feel like Cantlay is the forgotten about player this week considering he hasn’t yet teed it up in the Florida Swing with his last start at The Genesis, a T33. But that came on the heels of three straight grueling starts where he had a chance to win all three at the American Express (solo 9th), Pebble Beach (T4) and WM Phoenix Open (Runner-up, losing in playoff). He also finished T4 at the Sentry TOC, won the Tour Championship, won the BMW Championship, and finished T11 at the Northern Trust in an incredible run to the Fedex Cup title.

His strength is Off the Tee where he ranks #7 this year as well as Putting, currently sitting at #25, and he owns the 4th best Scoring Average. He has two MCs in four starts here and has never cracked the Top-20, but I don’t care, he has also never been as good as he is now.

Matthew Fitzpatrick 3-Ball +160 over Will Zalatoris and Sergio Garcia (DraftKings)
Fitzy was rather ho-hum the first two days at Bay Hill but actually shot one stroke better on the weekend than he did Thursday and Friday after the weather turned. That was his 3rd straight Top-10 and over his last five starts, his worst finish is a T12. He ranks #4 in SG Putting and #2 in Total SG on Tour so far this season.

Zalatoris and Garcia both struggled as the weather got worse, especially on Sunday where
Zalatoris plummeted down the leaderboard shooting 79, while Garcia carded a 75-74 Saturday and Sunday. I’m not fully confident in either player based on how the finished last week considering this week’s weather is going to be even worse.

Potential Players to Avoid

From Andy Lang: Dustin Johnson – His putting has been atrocious the last two tournaments in the US, it was good in Saudi Arabia, but he’s -0.49 SG putting and -0.39 SG approach the last three months on tour, and with weather conditions looking dicey I don’t trust his inconsistency so far.

*Nick and I disagree a bit on this next one…should be a fun head to head opinion to monitor this week.

Patrick Cantlay – He was putting lights out for six months, and last tournament his putting failed him as he was 45th in putting, and in that tournament he only had one round where he was plus strokes in putting. He’s missed the cut the last two years here, and I wonder if that putting is regressing a bit back to average. His price is a bit to high for me this week with lots of other options in the field.

Jon Rahm – When you’re the #1 golfer in the world, the #1 priced golfer on daily fantasy and you’re -180 or more in your head to head wagers, you need to finish top 10 to have any value. Rahm has finished 21st and 17th the last two weeks and that’s simply not good enough. Last week Rahm lost his head to head matchups against Rory McIlroy and Viktor Hovland as a big favorite, he’s a big favorite this week against Morikawa, JT and McIlroy….no thank you.

PLAYERS Championship Draftkings Darlings

The last couple weeks we’ve been doing stars, and scrubs, but with a loaded field the middle tier guys are the ones to focus on. Here are three gems.

Shane Lowry ($8000) – There will be wind and rain at this tournament this week, and I get Lowry at $8000 when he’s finished 2nd, 24th, and 12th in 2022 and he finished 8th here last year? I’ll take it.

Sergio Garcia ($7400) – He’s made the cut here 11 years in a row, finished 9th here last year and has finished 38th, 39th and 12th in 2022. If he was priced above $8000 I’d pass, but $7400 is a bargain.

Matthew Fitzpatrick ($7700) – Three top 10 finishes in a row, and finished 9th here last year. Shockingly undervalued this week.

Interested in placing a bet on this week’s PLAYERS Championship from TPC Sawgrass? BetMGM is offering a $1,000 Risk-Free Bet for first-time bettors in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Indiana, Colorado, Tennessee, Iowa, Michigan, Virginia, Washington DC, Wyoming, Mississippi, Arizona and Louisiana.

Tee Time from Vegas | PLAYERS Championship Preview

On this episode of WagerTalk’s Tee Time from Vegas, golf handicappers Andy Lang and Nick Borrman preview the PLAYERS Championship from TPC Sawgrass. Join Nick and Andy every Wednesday morning at 10am ET / 7am PT for their PGA picks and predictions.

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